Renato and the Lion
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
The touching, magical story of a boy in a war-torn country and the stone lion that rescues him.
Renato loves his home in Florence, Italy. He loves playing with his friends in the Piazza della Signoria. He loves walking home by the beautiful buildings and fountains with his father in the evenings. And he especially loves the stone lion who seems to smile at him from a pedestal in the piazza. The lion makes him feel safe.
But one day his father tells him that their family must leave. Their country is at war, and they will be safer in America. Renato can only think of his lion. Who will keep him safe?
With luminous watercolor paintings, Barbara DiLorenzo captures the beauty of Florence in this heartwarming and ultimately magical picture book.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
DiLorenzo's debut follows a Florentine boy who has to leave behind a beloved statue when war breaks out. Renato's father cleans the statues of Florence; Renato's favorite is the life-size lion in the Piazza della Signoria. When soldiers march into the city, Renato runs to protect the lion, but he doesn't have the time or ability to make a brick enclosure for it like the ones being made for other statuary. In a sequence that forms the story's emotional heart, Renato dreams that the lion carries him home under starry midnight skies: "They walked by the fountain of Neptune, across the Vasari Corridor, over the Ponte Vecchio." DiLorenzo lavishes attention on Florence's architectural treasures, and her buildings glow with warmth. Renato and his family sail to the U.S. and settle in New York City; only when Renato becomes a grandfather is he able to return to Florence and see his lion again. DiLorenzo's story is simultaneously a historical account of a family's emigration and a dream story about the power of great art. Ages 5 7.
